The Body is a Cage
by OyHumbug
Summary: Desperate to take advantage of what little time he has left and needing to feel close to his family, Oliver tries to lose himself in memories of his wife and children... only to, in the process, find them once again.


_A/N: Timing is everything... and not just with OTPs. This one shot, including its title, is inspired by Arcade Fire's "My Body is a Cage," a song I've known and liked for years, but it wasn't until I heard it Thursday afternoon on my way home from work last week that I truly connected with it. This story was the result. Enjoy!_

_Thanks,_  
_Charlynn_

**The Body is a Cage  
****An Olicity One Shot**

Insomnia was certainly not a foreign experience for Oliver Queen.

For most of his adult life - the beginning of which was marked by the day of his presumed death rather than a benchmark birthday, he had struggled with the disorder. _Years _when nothing good had happened would do that to a man. Even after he returned from the dead, Oliver struggled with insomnia. It wasn't until he allowed himself to love and, perhaps more importantly, be loved by Felicity that he was able to find peace, enjoying pockets of health, and rest, and respite in her arms. Then, once they discovered that they were pregnant, his insomnia all but disappeared entirely. It was like, in preparing for their daughter, Oliver's mind and body were reborn as well, were given a second chance.

A year later, and he would give _anything _to suffer from insomnia again.

In what was yet another cruel twist of fate that seemed to mark his life like a timeline of misfortune, Oliver was sacrificing himself, knowing that he was going to die, in order to save those he loved, yet, instead of fighting for his every last hour, minute, and second on this earth… and a multitude of others, all his body wanted to do was sleep. Oliver realized that it was depression - his emotional exhaustion prompting a physical solution, but falling asleep only to wake up alone - without his wife, without their daughter, without their son - just compounded his sadness and his fury, his resentment and his grief.

So, when John went home and the Monitor wasn't leading him to his certain death, Oliver went for walks. Leaving his leathers and any and all weapons behind, he'd take to the streets every night. Unlike when patrolling, however, Oliver intentionally turned a blind eye to his surroundings… even going so far as to tuck his chin into his chest, moving without seeing, treading without looking. He'd push his hands as far as he could into the pockets of his jacket, and he'd map the cities where he was sent, both familiar and foreign, one block, one sidewalk, one step in his worn and scarred boots at a time.

Striding off the edge of a curb and moving into a crosswalk, Oliver didn't even pause to check for traffic. The city was dead. Given what he had recently experienced on Earth Two, the description was in poor taste, but Oliver didn't care about saying or thinking the ring thing anymore. He was already dying so that others could live. Frankly, Oliver found that he just couldn't give anything else.

Although the rain had temporarily stopped, its ghost remained in the traffic light reflecting puddles, in the fog twining itself down the alleys and between the buildings, and in the heavy with unleashed moisture air. Oliver followed no real path. Eventually, signs of yet another morning, in another city, on another mission would encroach upon his deliberate ignorance and unawareness, and he'd look up long enough to find his way back. But dawn was still hours away, and, though what he was doing wasn't actually living while he still had the chance, at least he wasn't sleeping away his remaining nights either. Plus, the lonely, quiet witching hours provided Oliver with a chance to lose himself in his memories… both real and those imagined.

He'd recall each and every one of Felicity's cravings while carrying Mia, and he'd dream up even weirder combinations for the second pregnancy they'd never get to experience together. He thought about the first time he counted all ten of his daughter's fingers and all ten of his daughter's toes, and he pictured her doing the same as she learned her numbers. Oliver remembered each and every shade of his wife's many bottles of nail polish, and then he found himself chuckling at the image of Mia using them to paint the keys of her mother's laptop… much to Felicity's dismay. And he allowed himself to relive the moment when the doctor placed Mia in their arms for the first time, reimagining and repeating it with William, Oliver and Felicity watching on as their son met and held his baby sister. He saw Felicity walk down the aisle towards him, already his wife but also, for the second time, his bride, but then the scene morphed, and it was Oliver giving his daughter away at her wedding, Felicity at his side.

Approaching another crosswalk, Oliver found himself reminiscing about that very first night when Felicity helped William with his homework, and he envisioned her pride when, a decade later, it was William teaching those very same principles and theories to his little….

Tires squealing, high beams blinding, Oliver froze as the light from the quickly approaching car became caught in the puddle beneath his feet, casting a prism of red, and pink, and orange, and yellow over the water. But, inside of that cosmic fire that consumed all of Earth Two, he didn't see his mother or Tommy; he saw Felicity.

He knew she wasn't _his_ Felicity… just like he had known that the woman who ran Smoak Tech on Earth Two wasn't his Felicity either. But, just as this knowledge hadn't prevented him from wanting to see the CEO anyway - after all, if there was one thing that Oliver understood about the Multiverse it was the fact that he would love Felicity Smoak in any world under any circumstances, the knowledge that he wasn't actually watching his wife disintegrate into ash didn't make the sight any less traumatizing, any less harrowing, any less debilitating. In those seconds when she registered and then confronted her own death, the Felicity before him met his gaze. He watched on helplessly as some kind of recognition saturated her brilliant blue eyes - whether she knew who he was or she simply knew that he would help her, Oliver couldn't be sure, as she reached out a hand towards him in supplication. And then that was it. Just that quickly, a facsimile of or the Earth Two version of the brightest and most vibrant person he had ever met was just… gone.

It was only the sudden blaring of a car horn, the roared "what the hell, asshole!," and the heat of an engine close enough for Oliver to touch without lifting up or reaching out his arms that brought him back to the moment. Ignoring the driver's expletives and insults, Oliver briefly braced just the tips of his fingers against the sedan's hood, using the juxtaposition of the cool night and the warm metal to ground him back in the moment, back to the present, back with the living. Centered once more, he simply pivoted around and retraced his steps, never once apologizing to the driver.

Now, however, as he made his way back towards where he had come from earlier in the night, Oliver moved with purpose and direction. Every step was measured, and everything around him was registered and catalogued in his mind. While he still resented his mission and rebelled against sleeping and wasting even just a second of what time he still had left in life, Oliver now realized that he had to be smarter in his defiance.

No one had ever inspired him more than his wife. Even now, separated by fate and their disparaging futures, Felicity was still encouraging Oliver to find a better way. In that spectral vision, he had watched as the most luminous of lights was doused and then dimmed forever… as though the universe's hand had reached out and, with just two fingers, extinguished an entire world's flame, never to be lit again. The reminder of the infinite power he was up against and the sheer futility of his mission should have been crippling. And it was. But it also sparked an idea for Oliver. After all, if loving Felicity Smoak had taught him anything, it was the power of the mind.

Oliver had an idea.

^!^

It was red… not only because it was the color of the candle Tatsu had used to teach Oliver how to meditate but also because, given that Oliver wanted to focus and center his memories on his wife, there was no other color of candle he could possibly use.

Still in his jeans, and coat, and boots from his walk, Oliver sat down on the cold, unforgivingly hard floor, crossing his legs. With a cheap lighter he had picked up at the same 24 hour store where he had procured the candle, Oliver lit the solitary wick and then leaned back to relax his body into the ground. Allowing his arms to become loose, they dropped to his sides, the already forgotten lighter slipping from his slack fingers. Oliver closed his eyes, and he took a deep breath - in through his nose, and out through his mouth. And then he did it again. And again. And again. Just like all those years ago, he allowed himself to just… be, to float in nothingness without thought, without weight, without consciousness or consequence. All that existed was his breath.

At first, Oliver only felt a sense of peace. While he was still technically awake, meditating was allowing his weary and weakened body and mind to rest. His heart rate slowed. But then he started to notice subtle differences to air around him. Gradually, it became warmer, humid… almost like he was somewhere tropical. Briefly, Oliver wondered if he was going to get to relive his time with Felicity in Bali, but then he smelled orange blossoms. While orange blossoms did not preclude Bali, that particular scent was so strongly associated with Mia's bathtime that Oliver could not smell it and think of - or remember - anything else. And, just that quickly, he was in the cabin's bathroom once again.

It was a modest sized bathroom, according to Felicity. With just a single vanity, toilet, and a tub/shower combination, Oliver had found it small, but his wife had teased him mercilessly about his platinum spoon showing. Oliver always defended himself by explaining that, compared to her _petite _size - _'not while eleventy-hundred months pregnant,' Felicity would fire back at him during her pregnancy_, he required a little more space. But with its soft beige walls and warm wood trim, the cabin's bathroom had been more than adequate. Oliver and Felicity had still found plenty of ways to share and to _share in _the space. He had just enjoyed their bantering, those little head tilts and teasing moues such a staple of their relationship right from the very beginning - so much so, in fact, that Oliver found himself hoping that during this particular memory of one of Mia's baths, he and Felicity would engage in such a playful exchange.

Only… Oliver wasn't a part of the memory, and it wasn't like he couldn't see himself in it because he was simply reliving one of his own past experiences. Instead, while the setting was familiar to him, the situation was anything but. Mia's baby tub was nowhere in sight. In fact, his daughter was half-heartedly splashing in the same bathtub that he and Felicity had used - separately and, on more than one occasion, together. More importantly, Felicity wasn't kneeling beside the tub as she ran a sponge over their little girl's rounded tummy or a washcloth between her teeny-tiny toes, but, rather, she was taking a bath _with _Mia, and that was something she had never done before.

At least, she had never done such a thing while Oliver was still with them.

Uncaring if what he was witnessing was a figment of his own imagination, Oliver was enraptured by the sight before him. It didn't matter that Mia was obviously fussy and tired and that Felicity was so exhausted that she had dark circles under her eyes. The mother and daughter pair was the most beautiful thing Oliver had ever seen in his entire life. His heart, and his mind, and his soul _ached _with the need for such a scene to be real… even if he wasn't there with them to experience it. And then Felicity spoke.

"Alright, Little Lady, let's hope all of this steam does more than just make Mommy's hair curl up tighter than a bad 80s perm." Said hair was piled high and messy on the crown of Felicity's head as she leaned against the back wall of the shower. Her open legs were wrapped around Mia, who was sitting up all on her own without assistance in the shallow bath water, Felicity's feet meeting as if to corral their daughter and keep her close within her grasp. Despite Mia's usually adventurous nature, she didn't seem intent upon challenging her mom. In fact, she seemed subdued… more so than her sleepy time orange blossom baby wash could explain. Yet, at the same time, she was agitated, constantly lifting the hand that wasn't sporadically playing in the water to rub against her wide eyes, her chubby cheeks, her button nose, and her perfect bow lips. "Trust me, you want this to work, too, because, if it doesn't, you're going to experience the joy of a snot sucker for the first time."

So, Mia had a cold.

In what he was seeing, not only had Oliver missed his daughter learning to sit on her own and graduating to big girl baths, but, apparently, he wasn't going to be there to take care of her the first time she became sick. Missing out on a cranky baby with a runny nose shouldn't have hit Oliver as painfully as it did, but it wasn't just about not experiencing Mia's milestones, big and small; it was also about not being there for his little girl when she needed him the most and about not being there to help Felicity by sharing in the burden of worry, and fear, and even guilt over their daughter's first cold.

However, before Oliver could adjust to these realizations, the scene was moving on, and Mia was turning towards her mom, first scooting closer and then using Felicity's body in order to climb into her mother's embrace. Realizing what she wanted, Felicity picked Mia up and settled her against her chest. In turn, Mia seemed to burrow into her mother's hold, nuzzling her even. "You can't be hungry," Felicity murmured to their daughter. Yet, despite her pronouncement, she didn't discourage Mia's intentions either. As their baby girl rooted for her mother's breast, quickly seeking out and finding her right nipple, Felicity tilted her head back to rest against the wall once more, her tired, red, puffy eyes drifting shut in preparation for the almost hypnotic experience of feeding….

"Ow, Mia!," Felicity cried out. Immediately, her pained exclamation turned into actual cries as Felicity started to sob, tears forming fast and falling down her pale, grief-stricken face. At the denial of her mother's milk and scared by her mother's sudden distress, Mia joined Felicity in her heartache, first whimpering and then weeping her anguish into Felicity's breasts. Gathering their daughter even further into her arms and holding her just that much closer to her chest, to Oliver, it looked like Felicity was trying to make herself as small as possible and to form a cocoon around Mia. As he continued to watch them in his mind's eye, absolutely gutted, Oliver wished for better, happier moments for them but, for himself, knew that, no matter how despondent his wife and daughter were, there was no other place he wanted to be.

Rocking Mia gently from side to side, Felicity whispered, "I'm so sorry, Miss Grumpygus… though that nickname isn't really deserved right now, is it? Mommy should have known this wasn't a cold. Daddy would've known; Daddy would have realized that you're getting your first tooth… _long before _you decided to give Mommy a new exotic piercing. Then again," Felicity mused, her eyes popping open wide once more as she leaned her head towards her left shoulder in contemplation, "with his fascination with my industrial earring, he might not have minded your unintended foray into body piercing. But you don't want to hear about Daddy, and Mommy, and our reactions to potential nipple rings… and, oh my god!, I'm _so_ sorry; I'm turning into my mother!"

Oliver wanted to reassure Felicity that, like her, he, too, had believed their daughter to be suffering from a cold. And he wanted the chance to make sure that, despite her facetious words, Felicity was really alright, that Mia truly hadn't hurt her. And he wanted to take a moment to actually appreciate the idea of his wife with a nipple piercing. It wasn't a particular fantasy of Oliver's, but that didn't mean he couldn't enjoy the idea of it a little bit anyway. Oliver wanted to laugh _with _Felicity about her realization that, eventually, all daughters become their mothers, and he wanted to marvel with his wife over their daughter's first tooth. But, most of all, Oliver just wanted to be with them.

Like a needle to a balloon, the bathroom, and the tub, and the scent of orange blossoms, and the steam from the water, and, more importantly, Felicity and Mia just… ceased to exist, and Oliver was snapped back into his here and his now. But he wasn't alone. As he had compared the universe to Earth Two earlier that night, he found the Monitor with his right thumb and index finger holding the candle's wick where a flame had just been.

"What are you doing," the cosmic entity demanded of him.

Oliver simply responded, "meditating," though, despite that being his initial intentions, he was starting to wonder if what he had just experienced was more than just the product of his own mind.

The human brain was only capable of dreaming of people it knew, of places it had really been. Even if somebody couldn't recall those people or places when awake, they had been exposed to them somehow, someway in their past, the subconscious far more capable of remembering than the waking conscious. In a similar way, was Oliver even capable of imagining such details… even about the people he loved the most? What if, instead of his mind conjuring up just one of the many ways in which Felicity could have found Mia's first tooth, everything he had seen had been real; what if, through his meditations, Oliver's mind had somehow been able to travel through time and space to reunite him with his wife and child? He couldn't possibly begin to understand how such a miraculous phenomena could occur - the science, or the psychology, or even the magic, but he could appreciate it, and he could hope with every single fiber of his being that he was right, that it was real, that they had been real.

"Hmm." Oliver couldn't tell if the sound the Monitor made was one of acceptance or doubt, nor did he really care. "There's a new mission. It's time to go."

Standing with a fluidity that should have been impossible given the abuse his body had suffered over the years, Oliver met the Monitor's gaze without blinking. "Fine," he agreed, though the easy compliance was certainly not given without resentment or bitterness. "I'll go get my things."

And he would pack for his latest mission, and he would do what the Monitor said, and go where the Monitor told him to go. But, before he did anything else, Oliver also picked up his candle, taking it with him as he moved away to, once more, do the universe's bidding. This time, however, and for however many times he had left before his sacrifice caught up with him, the candle would be going with him.

^!^

It became a habit - nay, an obsession. As soon as Oliver had a moment to himself, he would find and light his red candle, sit down on the floor, and _meditate_. And, because he seemed more rested, less distracted, more capable, and less desperate, if the Monitor suspected what consumed all of Oliver's free time… even while during missions, he didn't say as much. More importantly, he didn't protest Oliver's new routine either. As for Digg, it didn't matter if Oliver's best friend knew of his meditation, because Diggle would support him in anything that wasn't giving up and giving in to his cruel fate signed and sealed by the universe and awaiting delivery by the imminent crisis.

On that particular afternoon, Oliver was idyl in his assignment as he couldn't act again until nightfall, so he took the opportunity that presented itself to him, and he settled down to spend a few hours of quality time with his wife and daughter. Oliver still wasn't sure if he had, after many years firmly rooted in reality, discovered that he had one hell of an imagination or if he had somehow stumbled upon some extraordinary window that allowed him to not only look _in _but also _through_ irregardless of the laws of physics and relativity. And, frankly, he didn't care about the how or the why; he just enjoyed the _remarkable _anomaly.

Every time Oliver _visited _his family, he found them with his mind just that much faster. This time, it only took a few minutes. He watched as Felicity stumbled into the cabin from outside, kicking the door shut behind her, laden down with both Mia and several bags in her arms, both of them bundled up in warm clothes and even warmer coats and scarves. Whereas Mia was also wearing mittens - mother and daughter both dressed in coordinating shades of purple, Felicity's hands were bare, and Oliver could tell that they were cold. If her nails weren't already painted a bright shade of blue, he wouldn't have been surprised if the chilly weather would have colored them a similar hue… at least temporarily.

"I know we could have gotten better deals online," Felicity admitted to their daughter as she unceremoniously piled their purchases onto the kitchen counter, "but _cabin fever _is _real_… thankfully _not _flesh eating but still unpleasant nonetheless."

After depositing and buckling Mia into her highchair, Felicity, first, blew into her hands and, then, rubbed them several times against her jean clad legs. Once she felt them sufficiently warmed, she started to remove their little girl's outerwear. As she worked, she talked, and that continued even as she took off her own coat and scarf and started to put away their purchases. "So, the cookies we bought at the bakery in town won't be as good as your Daddy's, but, if Mommy puts them in the microwave for a few seconds and lights that candle that promises diabetes in a jar, then maybe we can fake it until Daddy can make them for us again." Felicity paused then, stopped what she was doing, and turned around so that she could look at their daughter solemnly. "And he will, Mia. I promise you, he will. For both of our sakes."

Following her vow - one that Oliver knew he wouldn't be able to fulfill for her, Felicity turned on some music. As it played softly in the background, Felicity sang along while she haphazardly shoved groceries into the fridge and cupboards, completely ignoring Oliver's organized and even labeled layout… like she was trying to bait him into reprimanding her despite the distance and circumstances between them. She gave Mia some small tupperware containers and a wooden spoon to play with, the baby happily accompanying her mom and the radio as they all together made music.

Despite Mia's _inspiring_ drum solos, it was a sad song, melancholic. It begged for Oliver to take Felicity in his arms and slow dance with her. He found himself trying to recall the last time they had danced together, and Oliver feared it had been their reception. He added that onto his already overwhelmingly long list of regrets and missed opportunities.

The microwave beeping drew Oliver back to the moment and away from his self-recriminations. With a baked goods inspired candle in her left hand and a lighter in her right, Felicity set fire to the wick, leaning over the small flame and inhaling deeply. When she exhaled, it was like all of her hope went along with her released breath, and her shoulders fell in dejection. "It didn't work," she sighed, putting the candle and lighter down on the counter and lifting her now free hands to wipe away the tears that had surfaced upon her realization. "It's not right. It's not like Daddy's. Nothing's right. Not without him."

He wasn't with her. He was nowhere even near her. Yet Oliver's couldn't help himself. Reaching out an invitation to hold her, Oliver forlornly called out to his wife. "Oh, Felicity."

"Oliver?," she gasped, spinning around on her feet so quickly that her ponytail whipped around to lash against her cheek, and her tennis shoes squeaked against the hardwood floors.

A moment later, she was in arms, and he was holding her. A moment later, Felicity was laughing, and crying, and kissing him, and Oliver just squeezed her that much tighter. A moment later, they separated just long enough to retrieve Mia from her seat, pulling her into their embrace… much to their daughter's consternation. A moment later, without explanation, Oliver started to sway with his wife and child, sharing that dance with her, with them, that, just moments before, he had lamented not having. As Oliver buried his nose in Felicity's neck where Mia's downy head was resting so that he could take in their combined scents and as he slipped his hand underneath Felicity's sweater, trailing his touch up her spine until he could rest his entire palm over the back of her heart, marking and memorizing every beat of her life against his scarred and calloused flesh, his gaze caught the flickering flame of the candle. And he smiled.

It was real.


End file.
